


Can You

by fizzyblogic (phizzle)



Category: All-American Rejects
Genre: M/M, alternative universe, mind-reading
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-11
Updated: 2007-11-11
Packaged: 2017-10-07 20:18:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/68855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phizzle/pseuds/fizzyblogic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>For eleanor_lavish.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Can You

**Author's Note:**

> For eleanor_lavish.

Chris was wandering around between stages when he saw the guy.

He can't have been much younger than Chris. He didn't exactly stand out in the festival crowd, but he wasn't the kind of dude you'd look at and think "ah yes, he'll go to a rock festival for sure" either. Still, there he was, this kid who looked really young but seemed kind of older; something in the way he was standing, confident, talking to some huge hairy biker dudes, smiling the whole time.

Chris realised he was staring and turned away before the guy noticed. He looked down at his bare chest, shorts and flip-flops and as if noticing himself for the first time, thought, _Wow, I look like some blond California surfer dude_. Which he _knew_, he just hadn't ... looked at it before. Huh.

"Hi," said a voice beside him. Chris looked up. The smiling guy was standing there, right next to him, alone. "I'm Mike. You want to go get some water?"

Chris was thirsty. He nodded. "Uh. Hi, yeah, sure, I'm Chris."

*

Mike could read his mind.

Like, actually.

"Can you," Chris said, not a question, when Mike said as much.

"Yep," Mike replied, grinning even wider, watching him. "I know you don't believe me. No, I'm not nuts. They already played, you missed them earlier. _Were_ you --"

"Okay, okay, stop. Fuck. Maybe you can, maybe you're just good at guessing." Chris held his hands up. "But do you have to do it _all the time_?"

"Nope." Mike was grinning. Oh, okay, Mike was _obnoxious_. "Yeah, I am, I guess." He still wouldn't quit fucking smiling. "You know what, that sounds pretty good, we could do that."

"What?" Chris had been thinking three things in quick succession (am hungry; should try biting his thighs in case he quits being obnoxious; fuck, this is weird) and had no idea what part of which Mike was responding to, if he even was at all. The 'hungry, go get food' part?

"No, the biting," Mike answered.

Oh. Oh, okay, not really something he could guess. Probably. _Whatever_, Chris decided, _just go with it._ "Stop -- fucking _doing_ that, Jesus. If we're going to have a conversation, could you at least do all of it _outside my head_?"

"Sorry." Mike snorted. "And I'm almost eighteen, anyways."

Chris stared at him. "What?"

"You've been thinking this whole time I could be underage. I'm almost eighteen, so I'm not."

"Oh. Well, good to know, can we quit with the mind-reading now?"

"Only until I'm blowing you." Mike beamed innocently at him. Chris wanted to strangle something. "I have to use my advantages."

Chris gave up. "Fine. Let's go get food now."

*

Mike had not been kidding about his advantages. Chris decided to believe him.

*

"So hey," Mike greeted him, after fuck only knows how long of the weirdest relationship Chris had ever had, not least because it was never quite clear if it _was_ a relationship or if they were friends who screwed and hung out and sometimes played in bands together, "you want to meet Nick and Ty? They need a drummer. You'd like them."

"Sure," was Chris's answer. It was a word he had grown accustomed to saying in a variety of ways; mostly surprised, often resigned. It usually led to good places, where Mike was involved.

*

Mike was quieter around Nick and Tyson, somehow. It took Chris nearly an hour to work out what it was; Mike didn't hold conversations with their thoughts.

_Can you even read theirs?_ he threw at him. Mike nodded. _Do they know?_ Shook his head. _I feel special._ Mike snorted, passing it off as a cough.

It was almost seamless, the way Mike fit with them. Chris would have felt a little weird horning in on that, except that Tyson hugged him within twenty minutes and it left him just feeling warm. Nick smiled a lot, which was contagious, and when they said they wanted him in the band and clapped him on the back and pulled him into an eight-limbed hug, Chris's face was as stuck on _grin_ as Mike's.

_Yeah_, he thought at Mike through all of the body heat, _this will work out._

"I know," Mike mouthed at him over Nick's shoulder, and smiled.


End file.
